Saloon—Adults 31; children 3; Total 34 ’Tween decks—Married adults male 10 „ „ female 10 Single „ male 114 „ „ female 1 children 6 infants 4 crew 77 ---- Total all told 256 ---- All Europe sailed from Liverpool to the Australian goldfields, so that all nationalities were to be found in a Black Baller’s foc’s’le. I find the following account in the _Lightning Gazette_, the newspaper published on board, of 1855:—“Here in the steerage we find there are many nations, including Jews, Germans and French; the largest number, however, being English with a few Irish and Scots. Here are all ages and not all, but many, trades and occupations. Here are some more or less successful diggers, who had returned to their native land to gratify a feeling of love and affection; or it may be vanity; and who are now returning to settle in the land of promise.” The homeward bound passengers were just as mixed if only half as numerous—thus the _Gazette_ when homeward bound in 1856:— The passengers generally are a very mixed community, English and French, American and German, Italian and Pole, young and old, merry and sad, the open-hearted and the reserved, the enterprising merchant and the adventurous gold digger, artizan and mechanic, soldier and sailor, prosperous husbands returning to escort their wives and families to the Colony, and the disappointed man, cheered alone by the magic influence of once again beholding home. And under the heading of “The Gent Afloat,” I find a very amusing description of the adventurer of the times aboard ship, and though it is rather long, it is such a vivid little study of a type of character, only too common in the snobbish mid-Victorian era, that I cannot resist giving it in full. The Gent Afloat.